I feel strongly that I am an especially good fit for your MA Program in Counseling Psychology at XXXX College primarily because of the thoroughgoing nature and the widely recognized quality of your program, as one of the best in the Northeastern USA. This is especially true with respect to Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT) – with your program referred to as at the top in this area, among only a handful of programs the nation. This is the area in which I have the greatest interest and passion. I see XXXX College, therefore, as the optimal springboard upon which to build a career as a Counseling Psychology professional, very well trained, highly skilled, and an ultimately effective clinician who practices in all three of the languages in which she is fluent, Spanish and Greek in addition to being a native speaker of English.

The practice of CBT and other evidence-based treatments have repeatedly proven their effectiveness and not just in the USA but increasingly on a global scale as well. Another great draw of your program is the fact that the XXXX Institute for Cognitive Studies is an affiliate of your Counseling Psychology Program; and Dr. XXXX is recognized as one of the pioneers and founders of cognitive therapy. In addition to earning the MA Degree in Counseling Psychology, I also hope to simultaneously complete a Certificate from the XXXX Institute in Cognitive Studies. I find the collaborative research conducted by Maria XXXX, Ph.D, and Regina XXXX, Ph.D. on Postpartum Depression, Family Dynamics and Infant Development to be especially inspiring and I am convinced that their example will help my own research in CBT to develop in similar directions. I also very much admire the research of Dr. XXXX involving parents with infants in the NICU, to determine to what extent parental depression and anxiety, along with disrupted parenting co-dynamics, serve to predict the nature of families' post-release adjustment.

When I worked at XXXX Health Center as a Perinatal Social Worker, I had the opportunity to work with a family that had arrived from Puerto Rico just 5 months prior and who presented with multiple psychosocial needs. I first met the young mother when she gave birth at 26 weeks to a baby girl that weighed only 1 lbs 10 oz. Her son was 10 months old at the time. The infant stayed in NICU for more than 5 months, facing multiple simultaneous and successive health challenges including a tracheostomy so that she could breathe. The mother suffered from postpartum depression. I became the "go to person" when the providers needed to speak with the mother at the hospital because I built a very close and trusting relationship with her that went beyond interpreting, advocating and providing support in Spanish as well as English. This client in particular is exemplary of the types of clients to which I look forward to giving my all for a long lifetime of professional service.

At the Department of Mental Health, I worked with a family from Albania whose teenage son had bipolar and recommended for a residential program and a specialized school. The father spoke only Albanian and the mother spoke only Albanian and Greek. When I began working with this family their son had been hospitalized an hour away at a adolescent psychiatric unit. The initial challenge the family faced was accepting their son's psychiatric illness, and then they needed to accept that they were in need of support for their son and themselves. The teenager had been asked to leave two public schools and one alternative school system because of behavioral issues. I referred the teenager to a residential program in Worcester and he stayed there for a year until he stabilized and was discharged to his family. I advocated for the teenager to enroll in a specialized school where he was able to transition without major issues. One of the challenges in our area is the lack of Greek- or Albanian-speaking mental health providers. This is one the reasons I am pursuing a graduate degree in counseling instead of social work which I immensely enjoyed, to help fill this need for professional counseling services available in the Greek language.

I am currently a social worker who gives my all to my job every day helping women and children from multi-ethnic, low socio-economic, inner city backgrounds to meet the daily challenges that accompany so many individuals in this social context. I find my work most challenging which is why I love it so; and I am convinced that I want to devote the balance of my professional life to Counseling Psychology.